8 SCIENCE.
THOI/GHT-TB.NSFERENCE I N BOSTON.
TEE committee on thought-tmnsference, of
the American s o c i e t ~for ~sycilical research,
REDULhV FACSIilllLE OF DRAWIiYCY SHOWING YOXh EVlDENCI: OF SO-CALLED TIIOUGHT-TRANSFERENCE.
issued a circular dririog the minter, ilescribing
some simple expet itnents in guessing digits or
[vor.. TI.,NO. 126.
the color of cards to test thg theory of Professor
-
Charles Richet of Paris, that thonght-transfer-
ence inight exist to some degree in a11 persons.
A large nnmher of returns were received from
persons making the trials according t o the
directions of the circular, and the results will
JULY3, 1c;sj.l SCIENCE.
1)e publishetl in thc first nonlircr of the lwo-
ceedings of the society, which will appear during
the summer. Besides these set experiments,
Mr. TV. 11. I'ickering of Boston met witli some
success ill tlie csperiiiients which have attractecl
so muell attention from tlie English society, -
experiments in w21ich a drawing thought of
by one person, is reprocltlced by anotlier, who
has no risible means of obtaining information
as to what the drawing may be. I n the ac-
companying illustration we have reprodnced
all tlie figures as they were drawn, numbering
them froin 1 to 52. ?'he upper line in each case
contair~sthe originals, ancl the lower the re-
productions. Tile originals were made either
by Mr. Pickering or by one of his friends. and
the reproductions were most of then. made
by a yonng lacly, who. on one or two erenings
when the experitnents were triecl, met with
some success. I t may be well to state, that
with figs. 6, 7 , 8, and 20, certain extraneous
causes acted which interfered with the results.
The first forty figures were all made in one
day ; figs. 41 to 47 inclusive mere made by
another person ; the remaining figures were
made by the sensitive, so called. on a day when
apparently there was no thought-transference.
M I M I C R Y AMONG M A IZINE MOLLUSCA.
ITis a culrious fact, that, while aillong the
terrestrial animals the numbcr of lrnown cases
of protective mimicry is very large, among
aquatic animals it is very small. I have nodoubt
that the comparative poverty of our knon4-
edge of the habits and situation of aquatic
aniinals in part accounts for this, but I believe
also that there is really rastly less mimicking.
I do not lcnonr of any marine species, that,
llarmless in tliemselves, miinic formidable spe-
cies for protection ; but there are instances in
which forms are modified in color or shape so
as to resemble the surroundings in -which they
live, and thus escape the observation of their
enemies. In the sunliner of 1879, Dr. E. B.
IVilson, while studying in Brooks's laboratory
a t Beaufort, N.C.. found abundant specilnens
of Orulum uniplicatum, -a lnollusk living
upon the stenis of Leptogorgia virgulata (a
sea-fan abundant there in shallow sounds).
The stem of the sea-fan is of an orange-yellow
color, and, further, is often rnarkcd with yellow
swellings where the coral has spread itself over
the shell of an attached barnacle. The Ovulum
has a J-ellow shell ; and the skin folds up over
the shell, and is also of an orange-yellow color,
-precisely the same color as t l ~ a tof tlie pen-
9
natulid, -so that the snslil esctipes notice very
readily indeed. I t is abiunclantl~found upon
the Leptogorgia. anti never met wit11 except
associated with it.l I a s t summer at Beaufort,
in trawling in ten fathoms of water, a few
iniles off Cape Lookont, me took a Leptogorgia
whose general habit was the same as that of
L. virgulata, but which was very different from
it in color. I n this one the color is deep rose,
almost purple, and mottled with white at the
openings, where the polyps are fixed. Now,
the qnestion was, Is there an Ovulum for this
Leptogorgia ? and on examination, sure enough,
there was found a large number of the O\w-
lums, in this case again imitating the colors of
the host. This Orulnm is undoubtedly of the
same species as the yellow one. for it presents
no difference except in color. The shell is red-
brown ; and the folds of skin that snrround it
in the espanded snail are deep-rose color, and
mottled with white spots. Here, then, is an-
other very good illnstration of the familiar
principle that forms will vary in adaptation to
their snrro~indings,and of the part that mim-
icry may play in natural selection. Confined
in aquaria, the s~nailssought their own corals
to creep over thein ; and, if the red snail ancl
yellow coral only mere put into the same aqua-
rium, the snail sllowed not the least desire to
creep over the coral, but renlained creeping
about the walls of the aquarium.
I obsewecl another snail last summer that I
feel sure must owe its shape and colo~,,at least
i n part, to rnimicrj-, though here there were not
so goocl grouncls for the conriction as in the
case just mentioned. I found on the beach at
Fort Macon, one day after a strong southerly
gale, a single spccimeii of an undetermined spe-
cies of Scyllaea, - a l~iidib'anch characterized
by a pair of tentacle shiclcls, ancl two pairs of
elongate narrow processes of the sliiii upon the
back, on the inner side of which white clelicate
gills are placed. This creature, when l~laced
upon the Sargassum, or galf-weed, shows the
closest reseinblance to it. The color is almost
iclentical witli tliat of the alga, a light brown.
The body is elongate ancl much coinpresscd,
and the foot-sole an elongate, narrow groove,
perfectly adapted for adhering to the alga stem.
The tentacle sheaths and the skin processes
upon tlie back are thin, and at tlie edges are
wavy, and present the most perfect resem-
blance to the leaves (?) of the alga. The
compressed body is further terminated poste-
riorly by a thin ~rertical portion lilre a fin,
1 Dr. W. Breitenbsch, in Popular scie?ace ?nonthl!/,.T:inl~k~ry,
1888, p. 365, mentions ragueiy some nudibranch that imitates the
sea anemones upon the stems of Sargeuaum.